Once buckled into the Subaru, Jo reached over and smacked Nick hard upside his head.
"What the hell was that about Nicolas?" Jo practically screamed.
"What are you talking about?" Nick looked confused.
"Cush job, baby sitting mad scientists, security grunt? Were you trying to make me look bad or to make yourself look good?"
"I'm sorry Jo, you know when I get nervous that I stick my foot in my mouth."
"Well any more of that and I will put my foot in your ass. Got it Nicky?" she scowled. How dare he belittle what she did, she worked just as hard as any of her brothers.
"I just really want to make a good impression on your friends." Nick looked sheepish, Jo's glared rivaled that of their mom's and made him feel about 5 years old again.
"Then you are off to a bang up start. Look this town is full of big headed, cocky egotistical jackasses, so you should fit right in, but do not degrade what I do again." Jo was seething; all her brothers knew just how to push her buttons. If Nicky was going to live in her town he needed to play by her rules.
Nick slunk into his seat, Josie had really grown up. When she was a kid she would have just taken everything that he had dished out and more. It wasn't that he wasn't proud of her, he was just afraid that she was better then him.
The siblings were silent until they passed the security station outside GD. Nick broke the silence. "So Josie, are you dating that moody guy with the spiked hair?"
"Zane?" she couldn't keep the hitch out of her voice as she said it. "What makes you think that?"
"Just the look in his eyes like he wanted to murder me the second you hugged me." Nick laughed "The guy must have it pretty bad. Does Dad know about him?"
"Zane and I are complicated; right now we aren't even speaking. And Dad does not know about him because there is nothing to know." Complicated, yeah right. How do you explain to your brother that he has really known about Zane for years and that you had loved Zane for years but were now glorified friends with benefits but even that was up in the air because Zane was very angry and maybe rightfully so.
Pulling her car to a stop in her spot, Jo turned to her brother. "Look, I'm glad you're here really I am. But," she sighed. "Please don't belittle what I do ever again." There was steel in her voice as she finished.
"Yes sir." He said saluting her.
"Jackass" she retorted as she opened the door to her car.
"So do you want to hold him while I beat the shit out of him or do you think we should take turns?" Zane asked.
Carter laughed "Oh we should definitely take turns; we won't tire out as fast." His eyes flicked to Allison's office where Allie, Jo, Fargo, Nick and General Mansfield were gathered.
It took every ounce of self control Zane had to not punch Nick out this morning and now standing in the rotunda at GD he wanted nothing more then to storm the directors office and… What defend Jo's honor? Not that she couldn't take care of herself, but he needed someone to be the whipping boy for his rage and Nick Lupo seemed the perfect target.
"Calm down Romeo." Jack said putting his hand on Zane's shoulder. "Only child right?"
Zane nodded and Carter continued. "Do you remember how antagonistic you were to Jo when you got here? Your timeline not mine."
Again Zane nodded where the hell was Carter going with this?
"Jo has three older brothers so multiply how you were times 3 brothers. Get the picture? Little girls who dream of being ballerinas don't become special forces bad asses without a catalyst."
"Catalyst?" Zane scoffed.
"What, I actually do pay attention to you guys and your ubergeek science talk."
"Were you that bad with your sister?" Zane asked.
"My brothers and I were worse with Lexi. Sometimes I wonder why she didn't kill us all in our sleep." Jack sighed "the difference is, we grew out of it."
No wonder Jo was such a hard ass. Zane needed to talk to her, not right now though. He was still too angry to be reasonable with her. He needed to cool off, clear his head.
"Can you tell Jo I need to see her when she gets a minute? I'll be in my lab." Zane stalked off.
"Sure thing," Jack called after him.
Jo had felt the two men in the rotunda staring at her. She knew they were not happy and neither was she. This was not really the Nick she remembered, he hadn't been so mean so cold. Sure he was tough on her but rarely did he say things just to hurt her. What had changed? Was her brother's attitude one of the reasons the enforcer was so cold?
Jo was barely listening to the conversation going on around her until she heard her name.
"Jo can take the Major on a tour of GD and then I'm sure Sheriff Carter would be more then happy to give him a tour of the town." Allison smiled at the group of people around her.
"Excellent," Mansfield replied looking at his watch. "I need to go. Major take care of my town." He nodded to the group and turned to leave.
Just then the building shook violently.
"Explosion section 4, Astreaus life support lab." Allison called checking her computer.
Jo turned her head towards the rotunda she saw Carter but no Zane. Life support he said he was testing life support. Oh God please let him be ok. Not looking back to see if anyone was following her she bolted for the door and the elevator.
Fargo. Allison, Carter and Nick followed her onto the elevator. Lupo whipped out her phone and called someone on her team. "What do we know? "she paused. "Injuries? Got it. Be there in a second."
Turning to everyone on the elevator she rattled off "No serious injuries reported in the hall but the lab doors are shut tight with 5 scientists inside. CO levels in the lab are rising my guys are evacuating section 4 as we speak. It's getting dangerous in there."
"What could be causing the CO levels to rise?" Allison asked. Fargo pulled out his data pad and pulled up the specs on the life support system. Jo peered over his shoulder. Nick looked sick, he'd been there an hour and people were already in danger. What the hell kind of place was this.
"Here," Jo pointed at the pad. "If this relay was damaged then the micro scrubber could convert the carbon dioxide to carbon monoxide in stead of Oxygen."
"Excellent, now what do we do?" Carter asked beaming at Jo.
"Someone needs to manually shut off the main unit and turn the backup on." Fargo replied.
"On it," Carter said quickly "Which buttons do I push?"
Jo shook her head "Not that simple Carter, they have to be shut off and turned on in a specific order and we don't have much time. I got this one."
"Are you nuts? Josie you're going to run into a room filled with carbon monoxide?"
Nick asked looking incredulous.
"This is what it means to baby-sit mad scientists and I'm damn good at it." Jo spit back.
The elevator doors flew open. Lights were dimmed in the hallway debris was everywhere and Jo's team was ushering people to safety. Amongst the crowd Jo saw Zane and her heart skipped. He was alive.
Running to him she grabbed his arm "You ok?"
"I'm fine Jo-jo. I don't know what happened, stepped off the elevator and the hallway exploded. I think I hurt my leg."
"I'm glad you're ok." She squeezed his arm and shouted over her shoulder. "Someone get him to the infirmary. Carter, Nick help me get the door open to the lab and have medics on stand by to evac the people inside."
A medic grabbed Zane and ushered him into the elevator along with several others. Nick and Carter helped Jo pull the door open after she overrode the security using her password. Jo slipped through he door and into the lab. The door slid shut behind her and she quickly made her way to the equipment on the other side of the room. Thank goodness she had studied these specs with Zane so often otherwise she would never be able to do this.
She was already getting light headed but without hesitation she turned the knobs and pushed the buttons in quick succession. The back up whirled to life and Jo knew it was fixed. Pulling out her PDA she punched Carter number and gave the all clear.
Medics rushed the doors and grabbed the 5 people who had been slowly suffocating onto gurneys. Carter crushed Jo into a hug. "Good job, good job".
She pushed away coughing. "All in a days work. I'm going to go to the infirmary, get checked out."
"Right that's why." Carter shook his head at her.
"Shut up." She said as she strode past him out of the lab and to the elevators.
Carter looked to see Allison and Fargo beaming and Nick looking stricken.
"What the hell was that? This is supposed to be an easy assignment. These people, Jo could have died and now you're making jokes." Nick hurled his words at Carter.
"Calm down." Fargo scolded. "This wasn't even that bad, no zombies, or even the threat of having to drop a nuke on someone."
"What kind of place is this?" Nick asked. Sure he had seen crazy scary things in combat but this wasn't combat this was a security detail. Jo had never said anything about risking her life and WTF nukes dropping on people, zombies?
"Welcome to Eureka Major Lupo." Allison laughed.
Carter came and put his arm around Nick's shoulders pulling the younger man toward the elevator. "How much has Jo really told you about this place?"